


Something terrible has happened.

by IAmTheNightman98



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Muder, Romantic Subplot, TW: Suicide, Tw: attempted rape, tw: death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-19
Updated: 2019-03-19
Packaged: 2019-11-24 16:52:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,820
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18167744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IAmTheNightman98/pseuds/IAmTheNightman98
Summary: (1) New Voicemail.Brienne? It’s me, Jaime. Jaime Lannister. I know it’s been a while and I have no right to do this, but I need your help. It’s my-- fuck.  It’s my father. Tyrion and Cersei are here. I just -- Fuck. FUCK. There’s been an accident. We need you. I need you. How quickly can you get to Casterly Rock?-Something terrible has happened. When Jaime finds himself standing over his father’s lifeless body, he doesnt call he police. No, he calls an ex-flame from university, and it’s not just because she’s a lawyer now. It’s because he knows if there’s one person in the world he can count on to do anything for him - it’s her.





	Something terrible has happened.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a little different from my usual style so feel free to let me know what you think! 
> 
> Also, there's no past twincest between Jaime and Cersei in this fic.

_**Hello, this is Brienne Tarth. I’m sorry, I can’t make it to the phone right now. Please leave a message.** _

_Brienne? It’s me, Jaime. Jaime Lannister. I know it’s been a while and I have no right to do this, but I need your help. It’s my-- fuck. It’s my father. Tyrion and Cersei are here. I just -- Fuck. FUCK. There’s been an accident. We need you. I need you. How quickly can you get to Casterly Rock_

-x-

Brienne gripped her steering wheel so tightly, her knuckles were aching and white as she barrelled down the motorway to the Casterly Rock estate. At this rate it would be another half an hour before she reached her destination, which gave her plenty of time to think about how idiotic she was being.

Jaime Lannister, a man she hadn’t seen for almost five years, leaves her one panicked sounding voicemail in the middle of the night and she drops everything to drive two hours out of the city to come to him.

It had been ten whole years since she’d first met Jaime, but still it felt like yesterday. They’d been so young, so fresh faced and innocent. Where had it all gone wrong?

-x-

_“Excuse me? Hi. I live across the hall. I’m your new neighbour.”_

_Brienne’s eyes practically rolled her eyes out of her head when she heard the voice from outside her door. She was in her fourth and final year of university studying for her law degree and it was her fourth year of living in the halls of residence. She’d never managed to click with a group of friend enough to find a house off campus like most normal students did, so, here she was._

_She shuffled to her door, expecting to see some 18-year old fresher wanting to get to know his flatmates, but instead she was greeted by a very tall, well built, dashingly handsome guy who looked a lot closer to her own age._

_“Oh. Hi.” She stammered and he flashed her a devilish smirk._

_“Thank the gods there’s someone else my own age here. I thought I was about to spend the year living with a bunch of 15 year olds.” He said and as he spoke she couldn’t take her eyes off his pearly white teeth._

_“Um. The minimum age for living in halls is 18 actually.” She said awkwardly, looking down at her hands._

_“Ugh, don’t tell me you’re this boring all the time.” He taunted and she snapped her eyes up to glare at him. Before she had the chance to reply he’d thrust his hand out for her to shake._

_“I’m Jaime Lannister. And you are?”_

_“Brienne Tarth.”_

-x-

As she approached the front steps of the estate, her breath caught in her throat and she felt her hands go clammy. She’d made a mistake in coming here. Whatever had happened, she should’ve left him to deal with it on his own. She moved her hand to reach out for the large, brass, lion shaped door knocker, but the door swung open in front of her.

Jaime Lannister stood there in front of her looking dishevelled as all hell in a crumpled suit and with his hair stuck up in different directions. He’d let his beard grow out, which she thought suited him well, but that was about the only appealing characteristic of his at the minute. His eyes were sunken and bloodshot and she could see his left hand trembling where it gripped the door.

“Come in.” He muttered without so much of a hello.

As she entered the grand hallway she looked behind him and noticed his brother and sister standing behind him looking pale and afraid. Cersei was wearing an elegant looking, dark red ball gown, but her makeup was smudged down her face and she stood shivering like a leaf. Tyrion was also wearing a suit, but the jacket had been discarded and his shirt sleeves were rolled to the elbow and he too looked… traumatised? That was the only word for it.

She stepped further in as she heard Jaime close the door behind her and she turned to face him. This time when she looked at him she noticed the dark red blood stains on the cuff of his left shirt sleeve. She whipped back around to Tyrion and Cersei and noticed the blood on them too. Cersei had a light splatter of blood down her arm and Tyrion had blood on his hands.

“What’s happened?” Brienne said in a shaky, shallow breath. She looked at the three siblings in turn, none of which spoke, they all just glanced nervously between one another.

“What has happened?” She said again, much louder this time, but still no response.

“Its four in the morning and I’ve just driven two hours through the night to be here. So will one of you please tell me what the fuck is going on?” She yelled, feeling tears prick at the corner of her eyes.

“I think you’d better come and see for yourself.” Jamie muttered softly.

-x-

_“Brienne I know you’re still up I can see your light on.” She heard Jaime say from the other side of her door. She’d ignored his knocks the first few times, but evidently he wasn’t giving up that easily. It had been two months since she’d lived across the hall from Jaime and in that time she learnt that he was nothing if not persistent._

_“Brienne.” He drawled, dragging out the E sound, so she stood up out of bed and moved to fling the door open._

_“I need you to drive me to the petrol station.” He said, before she’d opened the door fully._

_“Jaime! It’s half past midnight.” She groaned, turning to walk back into her room, but he followed her before she could shut the door. “Why can’t you drive yourself?” She yawned, picking up the book she had been reading and folding down the page corner._

_“_ _My car is in the shop till monday.” He shrugged, picking up her rugby ball and tossing it back and forth in his hands whilst she pulled her hoodie on._

_“Then what do you need from the petrol station?” She asked, snatching the ball back from him, which he quickly replaced with the rubix cube that sat on her desk. He was like a child. He couldn’t sit still for more than half a second._

_“Doughnuts?” He shrugged, putting down the rubix cube then tossing her her car keys._

_“You’re such a child.” She laughed, tossing them back onto the desk, but he quickly picked them up again._

_“Come on, it’ll be fun.” He smirked at her and she cursed herself for not being able to say no to him when he tilted his head and flicked his tongue over his teeth like that. She supposed that she didn’t have to be up early, and now that he mentioned it she really was craving donuts._

_She sighed deeply and Jaime’s grin grew wider and she slipped on her converse._

_“I can’t believe you’ve talked me into this.” She laughed as she pulled her coat off the hook, shoving him gently towards the doorway._

_“Don’t be daft, you’d do anything for me.” He winked at her._

-x-

Brienne thought she might throw up. She’d never seen a dead body before, not even in photographs, despite having been a lawyer for nearly ten years. She worked in financial crime, this didn’t even come close to what she dealt with on a daily basis.

She’d met Tywin once when he’d come to graduation, and she didn’t remember much about him, but she was sure that now, she would never forget the look of his pale, lifeless face for as long as she lived.

“How?” She stammered, looking towards Jaime.

“It was an accident.” Cersei spoke up from behind him, moving forwards so that she could see her properly. “He was going to hurt me.” She stuttered, looking between her two brothers. “Jaime said you can help us prove to them that it was self defence.”

Brienne’s eyes left Cersei and shot to Jaime. “What were you thinking?” She hissed at him. “Why didn’t you just call the police?” She yelled before he could open his mouth.

“Because that’s not exactly what happened.”

It was Tyrion who spoke this time. She looked over and saw once again how traumatised he looked. She supposed that seeing your dead father laying in a pool of his own blood may do that to a person.

“There was a party,” Jamie started to explain, and Brienne turned away from the body, she couldn’t stand the sight of it anymore. “My father had been drinking and gambling with his friends whilst we took care of the guests for the sake of the company.”

“He was sick. He had a problem-” Cersei cut him off, but Jaime placed his hand on her arm to stop her.

“During the party, word began to circulate that Lannister Ltd was drowning in debt. I don’t know who started it, but people seemed to believe it. So we decided to confront him and try to set the record straight.” Jaime said, his voice was struggling and he seemed to be finding it hard to come up with the words he was looking for.

“When we asked him he went crazy. He sent home all the party guests and started screaming at us about how we weren’t grateful for everything he did. It turned out the company had been going under for months but he’d been gambling his own wealth to keep us afloat. Then when he’d told us that he started to- He started-” Jaime’s voice broke and he brought his hand up to his mouth, so Brienne took a step closer to him.

“He told us that we were insolent little brats. He’d beaten us as children and he could do it now if he pleased. Then he- he um-”

“He drew back his hand to strike me.” Cersei said softly, cutting Jaime off. “So I pushed him. Maybe it caught him off guard, or he was too drunk, but he stumbled backwards and hit his head on the countertop.”

“That sounds like self defense.” Brienne told them. “Why didn’t you just call the police.”

“Because of what happened next.” Tyrion spoke up. He was sitting on one of the breakfast bar stools with his head in his hands. “I hit him with a cast iron skillet whilst he was on the ground. He was probably already fucking dead and I hit him anyways. Over and over and over. I’m a monster.”

“He made us all do things that we didn’t want to do tonight.” Cersei reassured him, moving to stand by his side. “I hit him too.” Cersei told her, tears falling down her cheeks and Brienne flinched in horror.

“And where were you in all of this, Jaime?” She asked, turning to face him. He looked as though he might throw up.

“I couldn’t move. It all happened so quickly. I tried to help him but--” Jaime stammered, trailing off towards the end. It seemed to Brienne that Jaime was the only one out of the three that was actually grieving his father. He was doing this to protect his siblings.

“The police won’t believe that he was dead before he was beaten.” Jaime told her, and she considered briefly that maybe she had been too ready to believe Cersei. What if they had just murdered their father in cold blood and brought her here to help them cover it up? But then she looked back at Jaime and that thought went away. He’d never been able to lie to her.

It would’ve been easy for them to just call the police straight away and try to insist it was self defence, but Brienne knew that stress made people do stupid things - especially Jaime. Regardless, it was far too late to call the police now. It had been at least three hours since his death, and every second that passed was time that their story would become harder to believe.

“Why did you call me?” Brienne asked Jaime, still unable to wrap her mind around what was going on.

“You’re a lawyer and I trust you.” Jaime told her, looking down at where he was wringing his left hand around the stump of his right wrist.

“I work in financial crime and we haven’t spoken in over five years.” She snapped, tears springing to her eyes.

“You owe me.” He said softly, raising his eyes to meet hers for the first time.

“How fucking dare you.”

-x-

_Brienne felt a chill in the air as she walked home from rugby practice and she shivered, pulling her jacket tightly around her. It was late November and the evenings got colder every day. Term would be over soon however, so at least she’d be able to spend a few weeks in the relative warmth of Tarth._

_As she approached the doorway to the accommodation building she attempted to get her keys out of her pocket, but she was wearing a thick pair of gloves, so she fumbled slightly, dropping her keys to the floor. When she bent down to pick them up, she heard the first voice behind her._

_“She may be a great big beast of a woman, but she sure has an ass.” A male voice leered at her._

_Brienne took a deep breath before standing up with her keys. They would not provoke her to anger. “_

_Turn round for us, sweet cheeks.” Another voice said but she kept her head down, scrambling to unlock the door with her fob._

_She then felt a foot collide with the back of her knee and she lurched forwards, grazing her face on the wall as she fell to the ground. “I said turn around.” The man spat._

_Brienne attempted to pull herself to her feet but one of the men grabbed her by the hair and pulled her backwards._

_“Go start the car.” He muttered to the other, pulling Brienne towards him._

_“Help!” Brienne screamed into the night as she flailed her legs, kicking her assailant away. She feared that her cries for help would go unheard as the two men managed to pin her arms behind her back, until she heard the door swinging open behind her._

_“Fuck.” She heard the person in the doorway yell, followed by the scuffled sound of two men fighting. She looked up and saw Jaime had pinned one of the men to the wall by his throat and was littering his face with punches._

_Brienne then pulled herself to her feet and moved to Jaime’s side, attempting to pull his hand away. The second of the two men had already run off down the street._

_“Jaime stop. We need to call the police.” She cried, taking her phone from her pocket and rushing to punch in the numbers. She was genuinely afraid Jaime might kill the man, until he released his throat and the man slumped to the floor._

_As she brought the phone up to her ear, she noticed the unmistakable glint of steel._

_Swiftly, the man drew a knife, flicked out the blade and plowed it into Jaimes right hand. Jaime howled in pain, falling to his knees and clutching his hand to his chest and then the first man too ran off into the night._

_Brienne crouched beside Jaime, cupping his face in her hands as she heard the sound of campus security approaching in the distance._

_“It’s okay. I’ve got you. We’re okay.” She muttered into his hair as she held him close to her chest, waiting for help to arrive._

-x-

“How dare you, Jaime? I’ve spent the past ten years of my life regretting that night, wishing it could’ve been me instead of you. How dare you use it against me now?”

Brienne felt hot wet tears running down her cheeks. The night Jaime lost his hand trying to protect her had been one of the hardest nights of their lives. He’d spent years telling her that he could never resent her for it and that he would do it again in a heartbeat and now he was using it as leverage to force her to help him...Well to help him do what exactly? What did he think she could do?

“I’m sorry. Forgive me. That was unworthy.” He told her softly, taking a step towards her and she saw the look of pure desperation in his eyes. His beautiful, green, mesmerising eyes.

Brienne took a long drawn out breath and pinched the bridge of her nose as she thought about what she needed to say next.

“If you call the police now and tell them exactly what you told me, you might be lucky and get charged with manslaughter.” She said, looking towards Cersei and Tyrion, who stared back at her in horror. “Jaime, you will probably walk.” She told him, and he looked equally as dismayed.

“I’m sorry, but there’s nothing else I can do for you.” Brienne said, her voice trembling, turning around to get out of this godforsaken hellhole as quickly as possible.

Brienne sat in her car and cried for at least fifteen minutes before she even raised the key to the ignition. Why had she come here? She’d made a terrible mistake. She sniffled slightly then wiped her eyes, she needed to get out of here, but before she could move she heard a soft tap on her window.

She looked up and saw Cersei standing there, her pale arms wrapped tightly around herself on account of the chilly air. She thought about ignoring her, just speeding off in her car and never looking back, but instead she rolled the window down and waited to see what she had to say.

“You and I both know that Jaime wont let us take the fall for this. He will tell the police it was him.”

She was right, of course she was. Jaime was fiercely protective of his siblings. She couldn’t believe the thought hadn’t crossed her mind sooner.

“If there’s any part of you that still loves him, you have to help us. You have to do this for him.”

-x-

_Brienne felt sick with anticipation as she unpacked her suitcases on the first day of the new term. She had visited Jaime twice in the hospital after he lost his hand, but he had swiftly been transferred to a private hospital closer to his father’s estate and she hadn’t seen him since._

_She’d been too ashamed to pick up the phone to him for the first few days, but he’d worn her down, telling her that he was bored in the hospital and she was his only friend. She figured she owed it to him to be there in his time of need._

_They’d spoken every day over the break from that day on, some days for hours on end. She’d helped him pull through some incredibly dark days in the beginning, but eventually he started to seem like his old self once more._

_When he told her he was coming back to university at the start of term, she worried it was too soon for him, but he’d insisted he would be okay and today would be the first time she’d seen him in almost a month. She felt he breath catch in her throat as she heard muffled voices from outside her door._

_“We can get the rest of my stuff in a minute, this won’t take long.” She heard Jaime say before he knocked on her door._ _She moved to the door quickly and opened it without hesitation, trying to make it seem as though she hadn’t been waiting for him all day._

_Jaime’s right arm was in a blue padded sling, but other than that he looked exactly the same as he had done before. His flowing, golden hair was perfectly styled and he flashed her his signature, lopsided grin. She glanced briefly to the woman standing at his side, but could barely tear her eyes away from Jaime._

_“Hi.” She said softly, taking him in._

_“Hi? That’s all you have to say?” He laughed, then pulled her into a tight embrace with his left arm. She was cautious to not put pressure on his right wrist, but brought her arms around him awkwardly. They’d never hugged before, this was uncharted territory._

_“You smell amazing.” He whispered into her hair before pulling back when the woman coughed awkwardly behind him._

_“I’m Jaime’s sister, --”_

_“Cersei?” Brienne finished, smiling at her warmly, not that she needed the introduction. She had never seen photographs of Jaime’s twin, but she recognised her instantly. The resemblance between the two was uncanny._

_“Yeah.” Cersei smiled and Jaime shuffled awkwardly. She knew that their relationship when they were younger had been strained somewhat, on account of their father forcing them to compete for attention, but it was nice to see she’d come to help him move his things back into his dorm._

_“I’m going to go and get more things from the car. See you later, Blue.” He said, grinning as he used the incredibly creative nickname he’d thought of after two days of knowing her. She gazed after him as he walked down the corridor but Cersei’s voice snapped her out of her thoughts._

_“So you’re the ‘blue eyed blonde’ he so valiantly took a knife to the hand for? You don’t look like I expected you to.”_

_Brienne shifted awkwardly on her feet as she stared at the beautiful women in front of her. She gauped at her like a fool, trying to think of what to say._

_“Let me ask you, Brienne Tarth. How long have you been in love with my brother?”_

-x-

Brienne’s eyes flicked between each of the Lannister siblings in turn as they sat across the living room from her, waiting expectantly for her to speak.

“The primary reason I changed my mind is to protect myself.” She lied, looking at them firmly. “If any investigator realsies that I’ve been here tonight and didn’t call the police straight away I’ll be disbarred at best and arrested as an accomplice at worst.”

“I’m so sorry I dragged you into this.” Jaime said softly, but she shook her head to silence him. Now wasn’t the time for this conversation.

“Now, I won’t lie to you, every one of you is going have to do some truly awful things tonight, but I need you to do exactly as I tell you.”

She couldn’t believe she was going through with it. This was definitely going to secure her place in hell. She looked at the group, who each nodded softly at her before continuing.

“Tyrion, I need you to take everyone's mobiles and delete any calls you’ve made or messages you’ve sent since-” she winced, being unable to say what she meant. “Since the end of the party.” She said, hoping he would understand. “I also need you to delete the voicemail from Jaime from my phone. Don’t forget to erase the cloud backup too.”

“Cersei, you need to find cleaning supplies; disinfectant, rags, rubber gloves, whatever you can get, but most importantly you need to find bleach and a bedsheet.” She said and Cersei nodded her head meekly.

“And Jaime, I need you to take me to your fathers study.”

Once in the study, Brienne was incredibly careful not to touch anything as she took in the grand mahogany bookcases and menacing stags heads on the walls.

“My father once caught me in here as a child. I don’t think I’d ever been so afraid in my life.” Jaime told her, walking further into the room. She didn’t say anything back, she needed to focus.

“I need you to sign in to your fathers computer, open up a blank word document and write everything I say, word for word.” She told him, not meeting his eye. He looked at her sceptically, but crossed around to the other side of the desk and did as she told. He looked up at her, waiting for her to continue.

“To my children, I’m sorry that it’s had to come to this, but I am left with no other choice.” “You can’t be serious? You mean to make it seem like a suicide? That will never work.” Jaime whispered in disbelief, understanding what she was making him write. It was awful, disgusting and unforgivable.

“Do you want us all to go to jail tonight?” She snapped, blinking back the tears. She never wanted this to happen. Why did she listen to that fucking voicemail?

“No.” He muttered softly.

“Then shut up and type.”

-x-

_Brienne sat her desk staring at her laptop screen. Only three hundred words left to go. It shouldn’t take too long if Jaime would just hurry up and focus. She thought about telling him she would just write his assignment herself, instead of having him dictate it to her, but she knew he wouldn’t accept._

_Jaime’s first assignment since he’d lost his hand was due in in the morning and he’d left it until the night before like he usually did, forgetting that with his left hand alone there was no way he could type quickly enough to finish in time. So, he’d been laying on her bed, flicking through her books for the past four hours as he told her what to type._

_“There are people you could pay to do this you know.” She said grumpily, spinning in her chair to face him._

_“Why would I do that when I have you?” He smirked. He was now laying on his stomach with his feet crossed at the ankles, flicking through her psychology textbook._

_“Because I have better things to do with my night.” She huffed, crossing her arms like a child._

_“No you don’t.” He grinned, and of course he was right. In the two months since they came back from christmas, he’d been too self conscious about his prosthetic hand to go out, so most nights she spent watching films or playing board games with him. He knew that if he wasn't there she would have very little else to do._

_“Let’s take a break.”_

_“No, Jaime. I’m tired, I just want to get this over with so that I can go to bed.”_

_“Please.” He whined. “I have something I’ve been meaning to tell you.”_

_“What is it?” She asked, narrowing her eyes at him._

_“No, you need to come and sit with me. It’s a secret.” He said, saying the last part in a dramatic stage whisper. She sighed deeply as she got up from her chair and sat down on the bed next to him. She knew that he wouldn’t let it go until she did, so it was better to just get it over with so that she could finish the essay before she fell asleep at her desk._

_“Right. What is it then?” She said as she sat down and he sat up across from her. He swallowed nervously and didn’t meet her eye._

_“Well? Wha-” she started to say, but she was cut off before she had the chance. He cupped his left hand around her cheek and pulled her in for a kiss so passionate it sucked the air out of her lungs._

-x-

When the group had re-convened in the kitchen, Brienne looked at the bedsheet in Cersei’s trembling hands and winced. This was the part she’d been dreading the most. Brienne donned a pair of rubber gloves and spread the sheet out on the ground beside Tywin as all three Lannisters stared at her in horror.

“Jaime, I need you to help me lift him.” She said quietly, noticing Jaime wiping a tear from his eye as he nodded his head. As Jaime bent down, he tucked the note they had printed into his jacket pocket, then nodded solemnly at her.

He was so much heavier than she anticipated, but somehow they managed to shit him onto the sheet, with Brienne holding under Tywin’s shoulders and Jaime gripping his legs. She then without grace or delicacy, rolled him up into the bedsheet on the floor. For some reason, he appeared to be so much more frightening whilst covered in the sheet.

When she’d finished, she turned around and saw Jaime staring at her in anguish, running his hand through his hair.

“We need to clean up the blood.” She told them, handing out the gloves and cleaning supplies. “Every inch of this kitchen needs to be scoured. One stray mark and this whole thing may fall to pieces.” She said as they set to work.

As she scrubbed at the floor so hard she thought her fingers may break, she heard the sound of soft sobs behind her and turned to see Cersei crying as she washed the iron skillet in the sink. She looked so small. Neither Jaime nor Tyrion had looked up, so Brienne stood and moved beside the smaller woman.

Tentatively, she placed her hand on Cersei’s shoulder. “It’s almost over.” Brienne said softly.

What she hadn’t expected was for Cersei to throw herself into her arms, forcing Brienne to bring her arms up into a gentle hug. She held the younger woman as she cried violently and, despite the horrific situation, all she could think about was how much she smelled like Jaime.

-x-

_Brienne held Jaime tightly as they stood by their cars on last day of term, getting ready to leave and start their new lives._

_They’d agreed to try and make it work long distance, but she was moving to Winterfell and him to King’s Landing, which was almost a 12 hour drive away, and she knew it would be incredibly difficult for them. They’d only been together for a few months and deep in her heart Brienne knew that what they’d had hadn’t been meant to last. They would eventually drift apart, as most long distance couples with no real chance of living near one another any time soon did. It was going to break her heart._

_Hey, it’s alright.” Jaime told her, pulling back from the hug and cupping her cheek in his hand. “I’ll see you in a few weeks at the graduation ceremony.” He told her hopefully and she nodded, trying not to ruin his mood._

_“I’ll miss you.” She said quietly and he pulled her back in for another hug. They’d been saying goodbye next to their cars for almost twenty five minutes, she knew this one had to be their last._

_“I love you.” He whispered into her ear, then reached up to dropped a kiss onto her forehead._

_“We can do this. We can make it work.” He reassured her. “I promise.”_

-x-

The chill of the night air hit Brienne like a speeding car as she stepped out onto Tywin Lannister’s balcony. She opened the sliding doors fully, then helped Jaime drag the body through. She sighed deeply, willing herself not to cry and telling herself it would all be over soon. She unrolled the body from the sheet, then handed the sheet to Cersei, who looked as though she may throw up.

The sun was peeking ever so slightly over the horizon. They needed to act fast.

The sound of Tywin’s body as it hit the ground below was one that would play on repeat for the rest of her life. Bones crunching. Blood splattering. It was all too much. She prayed that it had been enough to cover his head injuries, giving the appearance that he had died when he jumped.

“Do the gates at the bottom of the drive have CCTV?” She asked, turing to face Jaime.

“Yes, but the cameras are set to only record if the alarm is on.” Tyrion told her before Jaime had the chance.

“Good. Then we all need to leave. Each of you go back to your homes. Don’t contact one another until someone contacts you and informs you of your father’s suicide. If anyone asks, you left with all of the other party guests last night. Do you understand?” Brienne asked and all three nodded at her in agreement. She moved to walk back indoors but first, Jaime spoke.

“Brienne, will this work?” He asked gently.

“I have no idea what we’re going to do if it doesn’t” She told him.

-x-

**_Breaking News. Two days ago, billionaire Tywin Lannister was found dead in his home as a result of suicide. The reason for this is presumed to be a series of poor investments which had caused Lannister Ltd to become bankrupt. Our sources tell us that police are not treating the death as suspicious at this time and our hearts go out to his grieving children._ **

Brienne let out a long, shaky breath as she heard the headline for the third time that morning. She pulled the covers back over herself as she burrowed into her pillow. It still didn’t seem real. It was as though she had lived the past two days looking through the eyes of someone else.

She heard the shower in her ensuite bathroom shut off and after a moment, the door opened.

“Turn this off. There’s no sense in watching it anymore.” Jaime told her, picking up the remote and turning off the television. She had been watching the news constantly since that night, convinced she would see her own face on the screen.

Jaime had come home with Brienne after that night and neither had left her apartment since. They barely spoke and didn’t sleep. They just held each other as they cried, trying to cope with the horror of what they’d done. They took turns at showering a lot too. It seemed that no matter what they did, they couldn’t seem to feel clean. She wondered if she would ever feel clean again.

“Have you spoke to Tyrion or Cersei today? They might need to hear from you right now” She asked, turning to face him where he stood in her bathrobe drying his hair with a towel. Having to listen as Jaime took the phone call where Cersei pretended to give him the news that their father had died, presumably for the sake of whoever she was with, had been excruciating. The three siblings had barely spoken since that night however, and Brienne worried for them.

“They both have their partners to comfort them, they don’t need me.” He shrugged, then looked down at the floor. “I’m the one who has nobody.” He added softly.

Brienne got out of bed and crossed the floor to him, pulling him into a tight embrace.

“You have me.” She whispered into his hair. “You will always have me.”


End file.
